1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method of controlling an optical-deelectrification in an electrophotographic recording apparatus, such as a printer, facsimile, or copying machine, having a photosensitive drum which is deelectrified by an optical irradiation thereto. This invention also relates to a method of pre-electrification in the same kind of electrophotographic recording apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
An electrophotgraphic recording apparatus is widely used in various printers, facsimiles, or copying machines, and such an electrophotgraphic recording apparatus includes many processing units, such as a photosensitive drum, a front electrification unit, a developing unit, a photo-depositing unit, a deelectrification unit, and a cleaner, and therefore, such an apparatus must have a large size. On the other hand, there is a strong demand for a reduction of the size of such an apparatus due to the current trend toward smaller office automation facilities.
To reduce the size of such an electrophotographic recording apparatus, the respective processing units must be made compact and effectively arranged in the apparatus, and in this connection, a deelectrification unit can be more freely arranged than other units. Therefore, there is a demand for a small-sized optical-deelectrification unit. Note, this unit must be sometimes arranged at a position from which an optical-deelectrification beam is not directly irradiated to the photosensitive drum, but is irradiated to the drum via a printing media.